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White Rock Swimming

Chase and Kane sitting on the white rock at White Rock.

February 20, 2016.

Another sunny and warm Friday, time for another adventure! With the same group of crazy kids from the Knapp’s Castle adventure, we headed to check out a new spot to cool off in the 80 degree heat. Kane had suggested White Rock and no one disagreed with his idea. This weeks adventure: White Rock.

We put up the third row of seats in the car and hopped on the 101 North then on San Marcos Pass. Our traditional Taylor Swift played along with a couple Sia songs, only when the boys had had enough with Taylor’s love songs. About 20 or so minutes up the pass and we exited at Paradise Road, just a short ways from the top of the pass. The camp ground where the short trail is located far back on Paradise Road. Almost passing it, we reached the White Rock camp ground where we parked the car and grabbed our things.

Santa Barbara and California in general are in a drought, most hikes include dry creek beds that have not seen water since the last big rain. So our instinct was not to expect a lot of water, if any was to be there.

The trail starts right at the parking lot and is less than a two minute walk to the water. The peaceful, quiet and clean air is very apparent even after stepping out of the car. For a random Friday around 3:00 pm we did not see another person or group around. At the creek , there was a good amount of water! It blew my expectations away and put a smile on my face to see all of the water. My neighbor who has been before said that the water doesn’t get much higher than it was normally, the only thing was that it wasn’t flowing.

The scenery was browns and greens, along with the green-brown water. The water was very cold but Mia, Owen, Kane and Chase didn’t care. They were on a mission to swim and weren’t going to let the cold water stop them. We hadn’t prepared for swimming on our adventure, meaning that no one had bathing suits or towels. That too wasn’t going to stop these kids either, they swam in their underwear and air dried instead of bathing suits and towels. Kids, being kids, were completely fine with this and enjoyed it more.

As the kids swam, challenged each other at who can swim the farthest, and splashed around, I walked around and observed what was around us. I walked up stream more through the brush and trees. As I walked I started noticing heart shaped rocks all in the same area, me being myself, I picked them up.

A couple of the heart rocks I found!

The boys swam for about a half an hour and ran around for another hour on top of that. In total our adventure lasted about two and a half hours, but was so much fun all the way through. I definitely recommend checking out White Rock!